by Nevil Shute
Corbett touched Joan upon the shoulder. ‘Go down and get some sleep. Put the children down, too. We shall be tired enough before we’re through with this.’
She went below and slept. When she came up again it was five o’clock; the light was fading, and the sea was a dirty grey. Corbett smiled at her from the helm.
‘The wind’s getting up a bit,’ he said. ‘We’re getting along fine. Come and take her for a bit; I’ll get a reef down before dark.’
She came to the helm. He went forward and took a couple of rolls down in the mainsail and stowed the foresail; the little vessel went more slowly but more easily. He came aft again.
She asked him: ‘Where does this course take us to?’
‘Seven miles outside Portland Bill—that leads us well clear of the Race.’ He looked at the patent log. ‘We’ve made a good five miles from the Needles. Getting along fine.’
She looked around, a little apprehensively. The sea was grey and angry looking, the dusk was falling. Behind them in the murk she could still just distinguish the high land of the Island; apart from that, there was no land in sight. It was unutterably lonely. She shivered a little.
He divined her thoughts. ‘It’s better than getting cholera.’
‘I know.’
He smiled. ‘Go down and make some tea—or I will, if you like.’
She went below and prepared the tea; then she relieved him at the helm while he went down and made a heavy meal. He came up and took the helm again while she gave the children tea; the bright lamplight made the little cabin seem homely even though everything was rocking on a slant, and she forgot her fears. She put the children to bed again when they had had their meal; finally she gave a bottle to the baby. Then she came up on deck.
‘I’ll take her now,’ she said. ‘You go down and get some sleep.’
He stood up and looked around distastefully. The wind was stronger, and the little ship evidently had all the sail that she could carry. The log showed thirteen miles from the Needles. ‘I’ll reef her down some more, and put on the little jib.’
It took him half an hour of heavy work, but the vessel went more easily under the reduced sail. He came aft, and looked again at the weather. The wind had backed in to the north and was freshening; in the saloon the barometer was falling slowly. A cross sea was getting up, giving an awkward motion to the little vessel.
‘I hope this doesn’t make the children sick,’ he said.
‘There’s no sign of it yet,’ said Joan. ‘I kept them sucking sweets.’
‘Glucose,’ he said. ‘I know.’
She turned to him. ‘You go on down below and get some sleep. I’ll be all right.’
‘Sure?’
‘Of course. Go on down.’
‘All right. Call me at midnight, and I’ll take over then. I shan’t undress. Call me if anything happens, or if the wind gets up any more.’
He went below and lay down fully clothed upon the lee settee. In a few minutes he was asleep, and at rest. The vessel tore on through the darkness in the rising sea; at the helm Joan sat struggling with the tiller and fighting her fears. She told herself that there was nothing in the darkness to be afraid of. She was not a child. Peter was within call. When the sea made that noise it wasn’t really dangerous. It was only strange. There was nothing to be frightened of. They were making a splendid passage down the coast. It would be a shame to call Peter before he had had a decent sleep. It was quite all right.
Presently a wave-top slopped up on the deck and brought her heart into her mouth.
A quarter of an hour later she heard a new noise in the darkness; the dinghy was moving about on the cabin-top. One of the lashings had slacked off with the motion of the vessel; with every lurch the ship gave the boat rolled upon the deck, looser at every minute. It might go overboard and be lost. She lashed the helm in the way that Peter did it, and in the darkness forced herself to leave the shelter of the cockpit and venture forward up the cabin-top till she could reach the loosened rope and get a heave on it. She made it fast, and looked around before she crept back to the cockpit. The vessel was rushing forward in the pitch darkness, lying well over; the sea was getting terribly rough. How awful it would be if she were to fall overboard! She would be swept astern and nobody would hear her cries, for they were all asleep. The vessel would sail on and leave her, and she would be left swimming in the darkness in the terrible waste of sea, to perish, drown, and die.
She gripped the hand-rail on the cabin-top very hard, and crept back to the shelter of the cockpit.
An hour later the foresail flapped suddenly; the wind was heading her. She pulled the sheets in as hard as she could manage, and the vessel lay over on her beam and began tearing through the water in a smother of spray. The sea seemed to have become much rougher. She glanced at the binnacle; she could not lie her course. She was heading much too far south, and the yacht was over-powered, her lee rail under.
She leaned in at the hatch and cried out: ‘Peter!’
He was on deck at once. She said: ‘Peter, she won’t lie her course. I think she’s got too much sail up.’
He took a quick glance at the binnacle. ‘All right, we’ll lie her to.’
He put the helm down and hauled the jib sheet windward; after a little experimenting she lay quietly on a more even keel. He slipped below and took a quick glance at the barometer. Then he was on deck again.
‘Is it going down, Peter?’
He nodded. ‘It’s not quite so good. We’ll stay like this till dawn.’ He touched her on the shoulder. ‘Go down below and get some sleep.’
‘What time is it?’
‘Half-past eleven.’
She sighed. ‘I thought it must be nearly dawn.’
‘No such luck.’
She went below and lay down on the settee. In the darkness on deck, Corbett settled down in the cockpit on watch. It was bitterly cold. There was nothing to be done, except to watch the vessel and to be ready for eventualities. Throughout the night the wind continued rising.
At three o’clock the vessel would not lie to any more; continually she fell away from the wind, heeled over on her beam-ends, and came up to it again with the sails flapping madly. He called for Joan; in the turmoil she had been lying awake upon the lee settee, and came on deck at once.
He said: ‘This isn’t working any more. We’ll have to get the sails off her, and run her off before it.’
‘All right.’
He started up the engine to help the manœuvring; then he got out of the cockpit in the darkness and went forward to take in the jib. Immediately he was soaked to the skin in the blown spray. He got the jib down without tearing it, brought it aft, and threw it down the hatch into the saloon. Then between them they got the mainsail down, got lashings round the wildly swinging gaff and boom, and lowered the lot down on to the deck. Corbett made it all fast in that position. Then they let the little vessel swing around and run in a south-easterly direction dead before the wind, under bare poles. He stopped the engine, and they went forward at about two knots.
The gale sang and whistled through the rigging in the darkness. The boat lay easily and safely, but with an appallingly violent motion in the rough sea. Below they could hear the children crying; Corbett stuck his head in at the hatch and spoke a word of comfort to them.
Joan said suddenly: ‘Peter, I’m going to be sick.’
He said: ‘So am I.’
They huddled together in the cockpit for an hour, drenched and cold, and vomiting from time to time. By experiment they found that they could retain brandy and barley sugar; no other food would stay with them. The children, lying in their berths and sucking barley-sugar, were not unwell; Joan resolutely kept them lying down. The baby, mercifully, slept through it all.
Presently Corbett made his wife go and lie down in the saloon.
The dawn came at last, grey and cheerless. The gale had not abated; the sea, now that it could be seen, was running very high. Corbett was not particular
ly alarmed. The little yacht was behaving well; she did not seem to be taking in very much water. He had only a rough idea where he was; he thought that they were heading more or less for Cherbourg, with eighty or ninety miles to go. The wind would drop he thought, before they ran that distance. He was most concerned lest their strength should give out with the repeated vomiting.
He called Joan at about eight o’clock, went below himself, and fell into a doze. Joan settled down at the helm with the sweets and brandy flask, chilled and fatigued, but not uncomfortable. There was nothing to be done but to steer the yacht before the seas; since that was her natural direction it required little effort or attention.
Presently a new sound attracted her attention. On looking up, she saw a flight of aeroplanes circling overhead.
She watched them idly; they were in a different world. There were men up there looking at her vessel, but they could not help her, nor could she communicate with them. They turned and flew ahead of her; following their flight she saw a vast ungainly block emerging from the mist. For one hideous moment she thought that it was a headland of the coast of France, that they were being driven dead on shore. Then she saw it more clearly, grey and menacing. It was an aircraft-carrier.
It was perhaps three or four miles away, down wind and to the west of them, heading on a course roughly parallel with their own. It seemed to be going at a great speed. She bent down and called to Peter; he came up on deck.
He studied the ship earnestly through field-glasses. ‘It’s either the Courageous, or the Victorious, or the Glorious,’ he said. ‘I can’t tell them apart.’ He paused. ‘Look, they’re taking the machines on board.’
They watched her for a time. The machines were circling round her, small as flies in the misty distance. They showed up clearly as they banked to turn; in straight flight they were little more than smudges in the sky. One after the other dropped down on a long slant towards the ship, flattened tangential to the deck and disappeared. With the fourth there was a difference. The plan form of the aeroplane showed suddenly and clearly at the end of the deck, poised for a moment, and then vanished. Corbett smiled. ‘They piled that fellow up, I think.’ Joan shook her head. ‘It couldn’t have been a crash. Look, they’re going on just the same.’ Another machine slid down to the deck and disappeared; the carrier steamed on.
‘It was a damn funny landing, anyway,’ he said.
Abruptly, from the bridge of the carrier, a bright light flashed. It flickered intermittently in flashes of Morse code. They watched it for a minute.
‘I believe that’s for us,’ said Corbett. ‘They’re signalling with a searchlight.’ He glanced behind him; there was no other ship in sight.
‘What do you think they’re trying to say?’
He shook his head. ‘Blowed if I know. I can’t read Morse.’ The searchlight went on flickering.
The last machine slid down on to the deck. The carrier altered course and swung towards them, still steaming at a great speed. ‘She is a thing …’ said Corbett wonderingly.
Joan said: ‘Like Broadcasting House going for a walk down Regent Street.’
As she drew near, two strings of brightly coloured flags broke from the yard on her short mast.
Corbett smiled faintly. ‘Too bad. I can’t read those, either.’
Quite suddenly she altered course away from them. For three or four minutes she zigzagged upon different courses, crazily, then with a swift dash she bore down on them. She passed behind them less than a hundred yards away, towering above them, confusing them with her immensity, blanketing them from the wind. In the lull they heard the sighing of the wind over her bulk, the shrill whine of her fans, the clamour of her passage.
A voice spoke suddenly from her loudspeakers, the bellowing of a husky giant. Joan started violently.
‘Yacht ahoy!’ The enormous voice spoke in measured tones, each word separate and distinct. ‘There is a wrecked aeroplane lying on the water, bearing fifteen degrees on your starboard bow, distant two miles. Go and pick up the crew. Raise your right arm if you understand, and if you are able to rescue the crew.’
Mechanically Corbett threw his arm above his head.
‘Thank you.’ The voice repeated, measured and distinct. ‘The aeroplane is fifteen degrees on your starboard bow, magnetic bearing south five degrees west from you, distant two miles. Land the crew in England if possible. You will be paid compensation for the deviation from your course. Good-bye.’
She swept past them and away; they were enveloped in a choking cloud of fumes. Through the smoke the gilt letters of her name, VICTORIOUS, shone out above them on a background of her dark grey hull. Then she was gone; her wake made a slick in which the sea was momentarily smooth.
Corbett was peering into the binnacle. ‘Fifteen degrees—that comes to just about south five degrees west,’ he said. ‘Steer south fifteen degrees west, to allow for us being blown down. There. Take her, and I’ll start up the engine.’
Joan took the helm and he went down below; presently the engine began coughing into the sea. He came on deck again.
Joan looked wistfully at the departing bulk of the great ship. ‘She isn’t rocking a bit.’
Corbett propped himself against the cabin-top and the boom, and stared ahead through the glasses. ‘I can’t see any sign of this aeroplane,’ he said. ‘We’ll have to go on for a bit yet.’
The motor chugged steadily beneath their feet; they went forward slightly across the sea. The motion was worse than ever; the fumes of the exhaust blew nauseously from the stern over them in the cockpit. Corbett leaned suddenly aside and retched impotently; presently he sat up, white and shaken.
Joan said: ‘Come and take her,’ and slid from the helm. It was better to steer when one was sick. She took the glasses and peered forward; presently she said:
‘Peter, what’s that over there?’ She pointed ahead.
He looked where she was pointing. ‘That’s her, all right. That’s the tail sticking up.’ He altered course a little more to windward and went on; from time to time they saw the tail of the machine again.
Joan asked: ‘What’ll we do, Peter?’
He rubbed his chin. ‘It’s not going to be easy. If we get down to leeward of her, we’ll never get back against this wind. I don’t want to get too near to her, either. We might get stove in.’
He gave the tiller back to Joan and got a warp out of the sail-locker. By this time they could see the wrecked machine practically all the time; she lay right side up, the top plane just clear of the water, the tail lifted high. There were two men standing in the aft cockpit, up to their waists in water. Down to leeward portions of the machine were drifting away; she was breaking up.
Corbett said: ‘Keep straight for her. I’m going to try and get a warp on board her, and moor to her by the stern.’
He tied a light heaving-line to the warp. As they drew near he held it up, showing the line and warp; in the cockpit one of the men raised his hand. Corbett took the helm from Joan. ‘There’s no second shot,’ he said quietly. ‘I’ll take her up as close as I dare. Then I’ll hand over to you and chuck the line. When you take her, turn away down wind and put the engine in reverse.’
He headed for the smashed and broken wing-tip. He held on till the very last moment, till his bowsprit was stabbing the air behind the wing, then he jumped aside. ‘Hard over now,’ he said to Joan. ‘Put her in reverse.’ He jumped up on to the cockpit seat, collected himself, and flung the line. It fell across the fuselage; one of the men got hold of it.
Corbett shouted: ‘Heave in the warp!’ As he did so there was a heavy blow forward; he turned to see the tail plane rising from the deck, poise for a moment in the air, and crash down on them again. He shouted to Joan: ‘Put her ahead and pay out the warp. We’ve got to get out of this!’
He ran forward, caught the plane in both hands, and broke the force of the next blow. As the yacht moved forwards the plane caught the starboard rigging and went sawing up and down. He man
aged to push it clear, pinching his right hand cruelly; then they were free. He turned aft to the cockpit.
He shouted to Joan: ‘Astern—put her astern again,’ and looked to see what was happening on the machine. They had not made the warp fast. Instead, he saw for the first time an inflated rubber raft, or dinghy, lying in the water by the fuselage. They had made the line fast to that. As he watched one of the men lifted the other bodily, heaved him over the side of the cockpit, and dropped him down into this raft. In the raft the man moved feebly, ineffectively. The other jumped into the sea beside the raft and floated high in the water, supported by an inflated jacket. He waved to them from the water, holding on to the raft with one hand.
Corbett said: ‘Head her over that way—pull them clear of the tail. Put her ahead a little bit. That’s enough.’
He pulled in the warp; the craft came slowly to them. As it came alongside, Joan and Peter leaned down and helped the fit man from the water. Then with great difficulty the three of them got the injured man from the raft into the cockpit.
The stranger said: ‘Good thing you came. She was breaking up pretty fast.’
Joan said: ‘Your ship came and told us. Why didn’t she stop and pick you up?’
The man said: ‘This is a submarine area. She daren’t stop. She’s got to keep on going.’ He wriggled himself out of his sodden flying-suit, and showed himself dressed in the uniform of a lieutenant-commander.
Corbett said: ‘You’ll find some dry clothes down in the saloon. Help yourself.’
The stranger said: ‘Later. Can we get this chap down below and get his wet things off? He’s pretty bad.’
The other man lay collapsed upon the cockpit seat, stirring a little with instinctive reaction as the vessel rolled. Water was dripping from his sodden clothes and flying-suit. He had no hat or helmet on his head; a deep gash showed white and unpleasant in the side of his face. ‘He’s the pilot,’ said the other. ‘His name’s Matheson. He hit his head as we went over.’
They looked at him in consternation. The injured pilot was a very young man, not more than twenty-two or twenty-three years old. The other was an older man, perhaps forty or forty-five. Joan said: ‘Let’s get him down below. We’ve not got a great many dry clothes, but we can wrap him up in blankets.’
